One good thing about the past few years has been the abundance of amazing speculative fiction books, and yet again, it was difficult to narrow down my list of 2022 releases that sound promising to a somewhat reasonable number. Like last year, I searched the web for early reviews, excerpts, and information from the author and/or publisher and came up with 30 books. (And of course, that wasn’t necessary for some of these because I’ve loved the author’s other works […]

It was a rough year between the ongoing pandemic and then being evicted, buying a home, and needing to do lots of work on said home, and I didn’t write nearly as many book reviews as I would have liked. (And a few of those I did write were catching up on books I’d read in 2020 and struggled to review because of, well, 2020.) But it was a great year in other ways. Women in SF&F Month 2021 was […]

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Note: Since I hope that this series will be discovered by more readers who will also appreciate it, I did my best to keep this review spoiler-free for all three books in the series. The Dragon of Jin-Sayeng concludes K. S. Villoso’s Chronicles of the Bitch Queen trilogy (sometimes called Chronicles of the Wolf Queen). It’s a stunning finale, simultaneously gripping with its many twists and turns and thoughtful in continuing […]

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Beasts and Beauty: Dangerous Tales is a collection of twelve reimagined fairy tales written by New York Times bestselling author Soman Chainani and illustrated by Julia Iredale. As stated in an interview, the author wanted these stories resonate with both younger readers and adults, and it’s published as being for ages 10+ in the US and adult readers in the UK. This book contains the following stories: Red Riding Hood Snow […]

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Spoiler Warning for Book One: This review covers the second book in a series, and there are some spoilers for the end of the first book. These are in the book description for The Archer at Dawn and are primarily related to where the main protagonists stand with each other and which sides they are on at the end of the first book. If you want to avoid this information but […]

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Description of The Jasmine Throne: A ruthless princess and a powerful priestess come together to rewrite the fate of an empire in this “fiercely and unapologetically feminist tale of endurance and revolution set against a gorgeous, unique magical world” (S. A. Chakraborty). Exiled by her despotic brother, princess Malini spends her days dreaming of vengeance while imprisoned in the Hirana: an ancient cliffside temple that was once the revered source of the […]